Shifters of Grrr 2 (44 page)

I screamed and begged for what felt like hours. My voice was amplified a thousand times by the long, dark corridors, but no one seemed to hear me. When I couldn't scream anymore, I realized once again how silent this place was. I started crying softly, whispering to myself, praying that someone would come looking for me, and cursing my stupid idea to come here without telling anyone. My father and my sisters would only realize that I was missing late at night, but that wouldn't help at all because they would start looking for me in all the wrong places. I was doomed. I was going to rot in this filthy cell, and for what? For a bunch of red roses.

CHAPTER TWO

I tried to sleep, but there was no way I could make myself comfortable on the cold stone floor. There wasn't even a bed in the cell. At some point, I ran out of tears, and all I could do was stare at the small window high up on the opposite wall and watch the little light that managed to penetrate the dirty glass slowly disappear. The sun was setting. I could barely wrap my mind around the fact that a long night in a cold, dusty cell was the only thing ahead of me.
 

I winced when my stomach rumbled, reminding me I hadn't eaten anything since breakfast. I shifted a bit, trying to find a more comfortable position for my back, but it was useless. All the muscles in my body screamed in pain.
 

"What am I going to do?" I whispered in the darkness. There I was again, talking to myself... How long was I going to keep myself company? Not long, probably. No one was coming to save me, and I had no chance of setting myself free. My only hope was that the
thing
would take pity on me and let me go. Maybe it would bring me something to eat... It wouldn't let me starve, would it? If it did come, I was ready to cry and plead with all my might. I had been trapped in this cell for only a couple of hours and I was already willing to promise my captor anything, absolutely anything, in exchange for my freedom.

More hours passed and I started crying again. I rocked back and forth, unable to control my panic and despair.
 

"I'm going to die here... I'm going to die here... Please, don't let me die. Oh God, please! I'll do anything... I don't want to die..."

It was like a mantra. A mantra that didn't help in the least. It only made me more anxious. With a grunt, I got up to my feet and started pacing the small cell. I barely walked four steps that I had to turn around and walk another four steps in the opposite direction. There was so little room that a bed wouldn't have probably fit in here if the
thing
ever decided to offer me one. Pacing didn't make me feel any better. Soon, I realized the only thing I was achieving with it was to raise the thick dust in the air, from where it stuck to my face and clothes. Still, I couldn't stop. I felt like sitting back down and pressing my spine against the cold iron bars would mean I was giving up. It made no sense, but I was sure the only sane thing to do was to keep pacing. Keep pacing until something happened. Something had to happen at some point, right?

I stopped and held my breath when I heard a noise down the corridor. It was soft, as if someone was trying to step as lightly as possible. Someone was coming. Maybe it was the
thing
that had thrown me into this cell. I shuddered at the thought, and even though I knew this could be my chance to convince it to let me go, my instincts kicked in and instead of approaching the iron bars, I took a step back, and then a second step, and with the third I hit the wall. I didn't know why, as I had never been superstitious, but I had a gut feeling that what was coming to my cell was not human. If it was the
thing
that had threatened me and locked me up, then it certainly wasn't human. No man could move so fast and carry a person so easily.

The steps became louder, then I heard a jingle which could have only come from a set of keys. A huge set of keys. My heart started hammering in my chest as if it wanted to break free, crawl through the bars, and go find someone else to serve. I pressed my cold, sweaty palms to my breast and willed my body to relax. If I wanted to convince whatever was approaching my cell to let me go, then I needed to be calm.

The sun had long set, and the thought that I had to face my captor in complete darkness almost paralyzed me. When I saw the shy flicker of a candle throwing long shadows down the corridor, I started breathing a bit more easily. I even managed I smile when the person who stopped in front of my cell and stuck a key into the lock while holding the candle with the other hand proved to be a petite woman dressed as a maid. A very sophisticated maid, since the uniform she was wearing looked as expensive as the dresses my sisters and I used to wear when father was still a wealthy merchant.

"Oh... thank God..." I whispered. I walked to the door and watched her turn the key in the lock. She didn't look at me. Her brown hair was tied up in a neat, tight bun, but I couldn't see her eyes. She kept them on her hands and on the floor, refusing to even acknowledge my presence. I was getting ready to ask her what her name was when I saw a second shadow coming down the corridor.

It wasn't a human shadow. As the
thing
approached the cell, its shadow grew bigger and bigger, until the beast it belonged to stepped beside the maid and in my line of view. I gasped. I couldn't believe my eyes. The
thing
was the biggest, most massive brown bear I had ever seen. Standing on all four legs, it was way taller than the maid. If it wanted to rise on its hind legs, it would have probably been too tall to fit inside the corridor.
 

"What are you?" It was amazing that I had found my voice.

"Not what. Who." The maid's snappy comment made me flinch. Great! The only three words she chose to speak were meant to scold me. Why was I so incapable of making friends when I really needed them? I lifted a questioning brow, but she didn't say anything else. For some reason I couldn't understand, she took a step back. The heavy lock was now in her hands, which meant that she had only come here to let the bear inside my cell.

"Oh no! Please don't do this... Please..." I was standing there, helpless, my body refusing to react. Even if I managed to make my legs work so I could back down against the wall, it would still have been pointless.

"I'm not here to hurt you."

That voice again. Booming in my head as if it had always been there and I just never noticed it.
 

"I am the master of this house."

I looked at the massive brown bear. It hadn't moved a muscle. It simply stood there, on the other side of the cell door, staring at me. Its small, black eyes glowed eerily in the soft light.
 

"Wait... you are..." I swallowed heavily. This was a bad dream. "You're the one talking... in my head. You're in my head! How can this be?"

Finally, the bear moved again. It was the simplest of gestures: it tilted its huge head to the side.
 

"I'm not in your head. I'm merely projecting my thoughts so you can hear me. I hope you weren't expecting a talking bear."

I shook my head, not as a response to his words, but as an attempt to clear my mind and gather my thoughts.
 

"This isn't possible," I whispered.

The
thing
ignored my confusion.
 

"I am the master of this house, and you're trespassing. Even worse, you wanted to steal roses from my garden. I am not pleased with that."
 

My eyes went wide with disbelief as my brain was finally decoding the meaning of his words. The master of this house? But how could a...? No. It couldn't be. There was no way...

"I know what you're thinking. Get over it. That train of thought won't take you anywhere. Instead of going in circles trying to find some logical explanation that isn't there, I suggest you focus on the issue at hand: you wanted to steal from me. No one has ever stolen anything from me without suffering dire consequences."

Right. The issue at hand.
 

"I'm sorry... You don't know how sorry I am. If only I knew this wasn't an abandoned house... I'd never steal from you or from anyone else. I'm not that kind of person. I just thought... I thought the mansion was deserted, and that no one lived here. I thought the roses didn't belong to anyone."

"What you thought doesn't matter. Even if the mansion was abandoned, the roses were still not yours to take."

I looked down at my feet. "You're right, of course. I'm sorry. I will pay you back. If only you let me go, I could go home and bring the money to cover the damage I caused in your garden."

There was silence for a long minute. My eyes went up to the maid's face, but she didn't look at me, she didn't speak, and she didn't even move. Then the bear opened the cell door with its huge snout, and I jumped in surprise. What was it going to do to me? Turn me into its dinner? No, I couldn't die like this... I simply couldn't.

"Don't..." I managed to whisper before tears spilled from my frightened eyes.

The bear stepped inside the cell. It was so big that my head could barely reach its shoulder. It leaned its head forward so its beady eyes would reach my level. I could feel its hot breath on my cheeks and neck. I gulped. I was pretty sure I had lost my voice this time.

"What? Do you think I'm going to eat you?"

Was that sarcasm in its "voice"? I shrunk even further into the wall, wishing I could just go through it. The beast might have "talked" like any human being, but it wasn't human. It towered over my small frame, and every puff of air it exhaled turned into sheer dread the moment it touched my skin.

"Don't worry. As I told you, I'm not here to hurt you."

It shoved its cold snout even closer to my face and sniffed me. It was all I could do to keep my eyes open and my breathing even.
 

"Then why are you here?" I managed to ask.

"To offer you a deal."

My ears perked even though my gut told me there was something fishy about this deal he was talking about.
 

"I am willing to forgive and forget, and even let you out of this cell, but on one condition: you're going to live here, with me, become mistress of this house and my loyal wife."

That was beyond fishy. Was the beast making fun of me? Was this its idea of a joke? I swallowed heavily.

"You can't be serious..."

"Oh, I'm always serious. You'll eventually learn that about me if you accept to be my wife."

"Never!" I couldn't believe I had found the courage to not only refuse the
thing
, but also raise my voice in defiance. "I could never marry someone like you. It's not... it's not right. I'm human, don't you see? I don't know how you manage to communicate like this, to put your thoughts into my head... I don't know what you are. But I'm human and I can't marry a... a..."

"What?"

"A beast."

That was the moment when I really thought I was dead. That was that. The end of my short life. The bear opened its huge mouth and let out a long, ear-shattering roar. I covered my head with my hands, but it was no use. The walls shook and, for a second, the whole dungeon seemed alive and throbbing with... rage. Pure, relentless rage. And it was all aimed at me. I had no idea how my body didn't just fall apart right then and there. When the bear finally stopped and took a step back, the dark corridors and empty cells carried its roar through the whole mansion.
 

"What's your name?"

I opened my eyes and looked at the beast through a veil of tears. Its "voice" sounded calm in my head.
 

"Aimée," I whispered.
 

"Aimée. Take tonight and think about it. The choice is yours and it is quite simple: marry me or spend the rest of your life in this cell. Corinne will bring you your dinner."

The bear didn't wait for my response, not that I was going to give it one. I guessed Corinne was the maid, who had waited for him to leave the cell and was now securing the lock back in its place. She followed the brown bear back to where they had come from, the small candle flame trembling in the dark.
 

I was alone.
 

***

Sleep didn't come easily. The delicious dinner Corinne had brought me did help, though. After a day filled with such strong emotions, I was more tired than I had ever been in my life. Eventually, I fell asleep on the floor, wrapped up in an old blanket the maid had given me. The dinner, the blanket... I had expected a moldy piece of bread and a glass of water if I was lucky, but instead I got two courses and dessert. So, on one hand, the master of the mansion was threatening me, but on the other hand, it didn't want me to suffer too much, otherwise it would have left me to starve and shiver on the cold floor all night. It wouldn't have killed me, of course, but the method would have had better chances of breaking my spirit.

I would have liked to dwell more on these thoughts, but strange, colorful dreams claimed me. I smiled in my sleep as I saw myself in a large ball room. I hadn't been to a ball in such a long time... In my dream, I realized how much I had missed it. The weird thing, though, was that the room was empty. I could hear an orchestra playing a waltz, but I couldn't see it. I spun in place, trying to locate the musicians. It was all in vain. I was alone in this sumptuous ball room, with no one to dance or talk to. Eventually, I shrugged and started dancing on my own.